Joseph J Gonzalez
When I first visited Cuba in 1996, the island was still reeling from the cataclysmic collapse of the Soviet Union. It was the agonising peak of what Fidel Castro termed the "Special Period in Time of Peace" — a masterclass in political euphemism for a brutal era characterised by total darkness, widespread hunger, and systemic material deprivation. Yet, beneath the crushing scarcity of that decade, there was always a palpable, underlying sense of shared national destiny.
Returning to Cuba recently, I encountered a fundamentally different kind of crisis: a slow-motion humanitarian disaster that feels entirely distinct from the past. While the current emergency superficially mirrors the severe hardships of 35 years ago, the psychological atmosphere on the ground has shifted completely. The island remains paralysed by rolling blackouts, crumbling infrastructure, and crippling fuel shortages, exacerbated by tight external blockades. But unlike the resilient solidarity of the 1990s, the dominant emotion defining Cuban society today is no longer hope or revolutionary pride. It is a profound, exhausting despair.
The structural contrast between these two historical eras is stark. During the original Special Period, Soviet subsidies — which had reached a staggering $4 billion annually — vanished practically overnight. Cuba’s domestic gross product plummeted by more than a third, and the average citizen lost a significant portion of their body weight due to severe caloric deficits. "It was the terrifying time when we resorted to eating cats and dogs," a longtime Cuban friend recently recalled to me. Back then, the dynamic was simple: if the state could not provide a resource, it simply did not exist on the island, and the cash-strapped government had no answers.
Today, the logistical landscape looks entirely different, particularly within the bustling streets of Havana. Restaurants remain open, and private storefronts are packed to the ceiling with everything from basic culinary staples to high-end American luxury imports. et, this superficial abundance highlights an incredibly cruel economic paradox: there is plenty of food available on the shelves, but almost no ordinary citizen can actually afford to buy it.
Rampant inflation has triggered a catastrophic economic freefall. The Cuban peso, which traded at a weak 250 to the US dollar not long ago, has utterly crashed to nearly 600. With average state-sector wages stubbornly hovering around a meagre $15 to $20 a month, purchasing a single pound of imported rice and beans represents a major financial hurdle. Meanwhile, gasoline has spiked to an astronomical $40 per gallon, sold covertly by resourceful entrepreneurs on street corners or operating out of defunct, state-owned service stations.
The most profound evolution, however, is entirely psychological. In 1996, Cubans were almost unanimous in directing their anger outward, blaming the strict US embargo for their daily plight. Anti-Washington graffiti was ubiquitous across Havana, and public frustration was targeted squarely at American policymakers. Crucially, ordinary citizens genuinely believed that everyone — including their revolutionary leaders — was sharing equally in the national hardship. They trusted the state's narrative because alternative information was strictly nonexistent.
Today, that foundational trust has completely evaporated into thin air. State propaganda has lost its iron grip on the public consciousness, fundamentally undermined by widespread internet access. Cubans now routinely log online to uncover the domestic truths that their own government actively tries to censor or deny. Revolutionary slogans are fading from public walls, defaced or completely ignored, and copies of the official state newspaper, Granma, are virtually impossible to find. "We have the internet now," a local friend explained to me. "We can read the global news for ourselves, and it makes it much harder for them to lie to us."
Unsurprisingly, public blame has permanently shifted inward. The everyday Cubans I interviewed no longer believe the ruling regime cares about their suffering. The collective stoicism that defined the 1990s has soured into bitter, deep-seated cynicism. Citizens now see a ruling elite protecting its own insulated interests while the rest of the population sinks into poverty.
This disillusionment has fuelled a stunning ideological reversal. Rather than rallying against external pressure, many Cubans are openly looking to the United States for structural salvation. "We are just waiting for the Americans to save us," one Havana resident told me bluntly. "The ones currently in charge worry only about themselves." Thirty years ago, uttering such a sentiment in public would have been unthinkable. Today, it is the prevailing consensus on the street. Cubans have entirely given up on the promise of reform from within.